I Just Love Books Like This,

although this is a copy of the original, 

all images © Taschen, I still find illustrations of the natural world fascinating, Cabinet of Natural Curiosities in  my opinion is the most impressive natural history works of the 18th Century,  

spanning nearly 600 pages,

the book is the work of Amsterdam-based pharmacist and zoologist Albertus Seba,

having collected a number of works he commissioned, in 1731 that he then published them into four, hand-coloured volumes,

the new Cabinet of Natural Curiosities catalogues these original drawings of exotic specimens in a single text and features writing by Irmgard Müsch, Jes Rust, and Rainer Willmann,

the book covers every kind of natural life you could thing of, from seashells, 

to snakes, 

with King crabs on the way! the book is available here at the TASCHEN site, I have to say the book reminded me of a trip we made to a real life museum featuring cabinets of natural curiosities, it was at 21 University Street, the Grant Museum of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy, that we visited after a afternoon cream tea at the Ritz, in the museum we were treated to curiosities like this:

a totally mad jar of preserved moles that I photographed at the museum, and many more besides.